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Obstacles Analysis of Kindergarten Teachers' Professional Development
Obstacles Analysis of Kindergarten Teachers' Professional Development

From 1970s to 1980s, teacher professionalization began to receive extensive attention from international education circles, and it is still in the ascendant. Obstacles to kindergarten teachers' professional development. The academic circles in China have also had a heated discussion about this. It is not difficult to see that in many articles, the specialization of primary and secondary school teachers is the most talked about, and the specialization of preschool teachers is only sporadically involved. The development of preschool education is inseparable from the professional construction of preschool teachers. This paper attempts to clarify the professional nature of preschool teachers through the analysis of their professional characteristics and professional characteristics, and at the same time explore the factors that hinder the professional development of preschool teachers in order to attract more attention.

First, the professionalism of teachers' profession.

Occupations can be divided into ordinary occupations and professional occupations, and judging whether a profession is a profession requires certain standards. Scholars have conducted extensive discussions on the standards of specialization, but they have basically reached a certain consensus [1]: 1. Professionals must go through the required professional knowledge and training before taking up their posts, and master professional theoretical education and skills; 2. As a professional profession and as a professional, individuals bear important social and personal responsibilities, and professionals should have high professional ethics and quality; 3. As a professional profession, you should have professional autonomy within this professional scope; 4. As a special profession, only when it is needed and recognized by the society and a set of corresponding systems is established and implemented can the professional status be truly established or improved. According to this standard, teachers' profession has not gained extensive and highly democratic autonomy because of external intervention and monitoring, and employees have not received short-term specialized training and have not won lofty social and economic status. Therefore, some people think that teachers can not be called majors, but only "quasi-majors" or "semi-majors". But whether a major can be called a major depends on its own nature and development level. In fact, teachers have all the characteristics of specialization: the main task of teachers is to teach and educate people, and teachers play a leading role in the process of educating students. In order to effectively carry out education and teaching activities, teachers must have systematic and extensive professional knowledge and educational psychology knowledge, superb and skilled educational skills and good professional ethics, and must be recognized by teachers' qualifications. These are enough to prove that the teaching profession has the basic characteristics of professionals, and the teaching profession has professional attributes, [2] but its own development level and external conditions are not yet mature. Even those who have a negative attitude towards teachers' professional specialization deny not the possibility of teachers' professional specialization, but their dissatisfaction with the present situation of teachers. With people's increasing concern about teachers' quality, it has become the consensus of educational theorists and all walks of life to regard teachers or teaching as a special profession. [3]

The object of teachers' labor is people with great plasticity and initiative, which determines that teachers not only have the commonness of general majors, but also have the personality different from doctors, lawyers and other majors, which is embodied in [4]: (1) In addition to specialized scientific knowledge, teachers should also have practical wisdom, critical thinking, creative action and the ability to seek change; (2) The way to cultivate and improve teachers should not only be the training of professional skills, but also emphasize teachers' reflection and exploration on the actual situation of education and the dialogue and communication between teachers; (3) Compared with doctors and lawyers, teachers' professional ethics is more altruistic, more important and more basic than professional knowledge; (4) Teachers' duty is not only to teach, but also to educate people. Teaching is not only a professional with knowledge and skills, but also a kind of interpersonal relationship. Establishing good interpersonal and emotional relationships with students is an important aspect of teachers' work, so teachers' personality characteristics such as desire, emotion, values and beliefs should also be an important part of teachers' professional development. (5) Compared with doctors and lawyers, the role of teachers' professional organizations is not market monopoly and self-protection, but that teachers, as a learning community, should have the right to decide their own development direction.

Teachers' special professional knowledge and skills, professional training, professional ethics and professional autonomy make teachers' professionalization not only an understanding, but also a struggle process. It is not only the recognition of professional qualifications, but also the conscious pursuit of lifelong learning and continuous renewal. Just as the characteristics of teachers' working objects determine the professional particularity of teachers, the physical and mental characteristics of children also make preschool teachers have different professional characteristics from other teachers.

Second, the professional characteristics of preschool teachers

Specialization is the development trend of teacher education. Preschool teachers belong to the group of teachers, have the professional characteristics of ordinary teachers, and should also be an indispensable part. Unfortunately, when it comes to education, preschool education can easily be regarded as "special". It may be because kindergarten teachers work with children aged 3-6, and the knowledge they teach is easy to understand, which is easily mistaken for a career that ordinary people can engage in. In fact, it is children's unique physiological and psychological characteristics that determine the complexity and particularity of preschool education and the professional characteristics of preschool teachers.

First of all, preschool teachers work with children aged 3-6, who are in the stage of rapid physical and mental development. Preschool teachers must implement the principle of combining protection with education, not only to educate all children in physical, intellectual, moral and aesthetic aspects, but also to be responsible for their life; We should not only cultivate children by example after class, but also cooperate closely with society and family to achieve the consistency of education. This puts forward higher requirements for teachers' professional attitude and professional norms.

Second, children's curiosity and thirst for knowledge are very strong, and their thinking forms are mainly intuitive action thinking and concrete image thinking, which requires kindergarten teachers not only to be good at singing and dancing, but also to have extensive knowledge, to master the characteristics of children's understanding, and to have higher requirements for teaching skills.

Third, children's development has both stages and continuity, and childhood is a critical period for the development of individual psychology in many aspects. Teachers must carefully grasp the law of children's development in different stages, pay attention to children's actual life and performance, and keenly capture children's various psychological needs in order to promote children's development to the maximum extent. However, it is not a day's work to understand the development law of children and grasp their psychological characteristics, which requires the unremitting efforts of kindergarten teachers.

Fourthly, the characteristics of children's liveliness and poor self-control put forward higher requirements for preschool teachers in organizational ability. Children's interests and personality are very uncertain, which requires kindergarten teachers to be better at understanding children, inspiring and inducing children and educating them individually.

It can be seen that preschool teachers have their unique professional characteristics, which are the objective basis for their professional development. The National Association of Preschool Education (NAEYC) points out that the professionalization of preschool teachers should be reflected in: having a deep understanding and understanding of children's development, and applying psychology and pedagogy knowledge to practice; Be good at observing and evaluating children's behavior as the basis for curriculum planning and designing personalized courses; Be good at creating and maintaining a safe and healthy atmosphere for children.

Surround; Plan and implement the curriculum suitable for children's development, and comprehensively promote children's social, emotional, intellectual and physical development; Establish a positive interaction with children and become a supporting force for their development; Establish a positive and effective relationship with children's families; Support children's individual development and learning, so that children can be fully understood in the family, culture and social background; Recognize the professionalism of teachers. [5]

Looking at the present situation of preschool education in China, there is still a big gap compared with the professional requirements of preschool teachers mentioned above. Most kindergarten teachers in China are secondary school teachers or below, and their cultural theory level is generally not high; The enrollment starting point of preschool normal schools is low, and the cultural theoretical foundation is weak. However, during the 3-4 years of study, students mainly focus on skills and skills training, with a narrow foundation of professional theoretical courses and lack of adaptability, creativity and scientific research ability; However, most of the current preschool teacher training is a "free ride" for primary school teachers, so the training content is not targeted, and more training is just a formality, with little effect. Family cooperation has also progressed slowly. Another data shows that preschool teachers have great psychological pressure, low enthusiasm for teaching, and a big problem of loving children [6]. It seems that the professional development of preschool teachers in China has a long way to go, and there are still many factors that are not conducive to the professional development of preschool teachers.

Third, the obstacles that affect the professional development of preschool teachers.

There are many factors that affect the professional growth of kindergarten teachers, including external factors such as low public recognition and expectation of kindergarten teachers' profession, closed kindergarten management, uncoordinated humanistic environment, and internal factors such as unsynchronized kindergarten teachers and social concepts, single way of thinking, and slow knowledge update [7]. Here, we will make a concrete analysis from five aspects, and analyze the obstacles to the professional development of friends of principals and kindergarten teachers.

1, deviation in concept and understanding

Society and parents have a vague understanding of teachers' professionalism. It is generally believed that preschool teachers can only take children, sing and dance, and do not need advanced knowledge. Therefore, their career expectations for preschool teachers are low. Graduates from kindergarten schools have no objection to being kindergarten teachers, but undergraduates who teach in kindergartens may attract surprised eyes. As for masters and doctors engaged in preschool education, I haven't thought about it. This virtually prevents highly educated people from entering the preschool education team, which is not conducive to the improvement of the overall educational level of preschool teachers. In addition, the public, especially some parents, still have some misunderstandings about the goals and contents of early childhood education. Due to traditional, historical and realistic reasons, there are still some problems in society, such as neglecting the cultivation of children's good behavior, habits, emotions, attitudes, autonomy and social skills. Even in cognitive education, there are many deviations, which focus on children's systematic knowledge learning and intelligence, skills and skill training, while ignoring the cultivation of children's learning interest, motivation, initiative and creativity. [8] In order to meet the needs of parents, kindergartens and teachers only pay attention to the imparting of children's knowledge and the cultivation of intelligence, which makes the teaching practice ability of kindergarten teachers not fully developed and improved.

The primary condition for the professional growth of kindergarten teachers is a deep understanding of preschool education, kindergartens, especially their own existence and development. It is worth noting that many preschool teachers themselves are not aware of the professionalism of preschool teachers' profession, and think that the biggest future of preschool teachers is to be class teachers, and never think that preschool teachers' profession itself has great room for development. Teachers' professional growth is a process of teachers' self-improvement. If the deviation of society and parents' understanding of preschool teachers' professional development loses its heteronomy, then the lack of understanding of preschool teachers' professional development is even more terrible, because teachers' professional development depends more on teachers' self-discipline and teachers' continuous reflection and exploration of teaching practice. As Piaget said: "The general reason is what others think, and what is particularly bad is that he himself thinks that school teachers are not experts in technical and scientific creativity, but just a knowledge transmitter, which is something anyone can do" [9]. Therefore, preschool teachers' professional recognition of this profession is the premise of preschool teachers' professional construction.

2. The social status of preschool teachers needs to be improved.

At present, the mobility of preschool teachers is relatively large, especially the teachers in private and private kindergartens are very unstable. There are many reasons for this situation, except psychological pressure and heavy burden. The main reason may be their low social status and low treatment. Professional prestige can reflect the social status of a profession to a certain extent. A survey on professional prestige shows that university professors have the highest professional prestige, with a grade of 2; Primary and secondary school teachers rank 29th, but the professional prestige of kindergarten teachers who also contribute to basic education has dropped to 36 [10], which is not low in 100 occupation, but there is still a big gap compared with other teachers' occupations. Based on the statistics of Guangdong preschool teachers' questionnaires, the author found that the salaries of preschool teachers vary greatly, ranging from 4,000 yuan to 400-500 yuan, most of which do not exceed 1000 yuan, and various insurance benefits are not in place. Therefore, many people just regard kindergarten teachers as a springboard, and when they have the right opportunity, they will find another job, which is not conducive to children's development and seriously restricts the process of kindergarten teachers' specialization.

In addition to the above-mentioned explicit manifestations, another feudal thought of "men are superior to women" may also potentially affect the improvement of the social status of preschool teachers. In our culture, a widely accepted value is that women are considered to be born with maternity, sensibility and care for their husbands and children. The most suitable jobs for them are wives and mothers, kindergarten teachers or primary school teachers, company secretaries, nurses, nurses, waiters and other auxiliary and supportive jobs. For many years, women's social status in people's minds has been lower than that of men, and even if they do the same job as men, their income may be lower than that of men. Although men have been encouraged to join the kindergarten teachers, most of them are still women, which will inevitably affect the improvement of their professional and social status.

3. Lack of professional autonomy

Professional autonomy is one of the main goals of teachers' professional development. As mentioned above, teachers' professional autonomy should be mainly manifested in the right to decide their own development direction. In fact, preschool teachers are at the bottom of the school administrative orders and bureaucratic system, and their behavior is controlled by the education administrative department, the public, the director of teaching and research, and the person in charge of the school. The autonomy of preschool teachers is controversial, the decision-making power is questioned, and the authority of teachers is seriously challenged. It is not uncommon for people who don't understand preschool education to lead preschool education. Moreover, kindergarten teachers are often regarded as "dancers", and frequent rehearsal programs seriously interfere with the normal teaching of kindergartens. Other inspections, such as sanitation and fire protection, make kindergartens overwhelmed. Too many rigid requirements of educational administrative organs have largely restricted the autonomy of kindergartens to play their own characteristics, which has led to the phenomenon of "doing for the sake of doing" in some kindergartens. A kindergarten director who runs a good school once complained that he was chased and sponsored by some departments like the "God of Wealth", and he had to live in seclusion after every meeting and "disappear" as soon as possible to reduce unnecessary troubles. It seems that in order to effectively improve the teaching quality of kindergartens, we must first "loosen" kindergartens.

4. Theoretical research is relatively lacking.

To become a major, a major must have systematic and complete theoretical support. In recent years, although China's early childhood education has made great progress, it still lacks a systematic theory suitable for the development of early childhood in China. Generally speaking, the theoretical research of early childhood education in China is still in the stage of learning and introducing advanced foreign early childhood education theories. Of course, this is an effective way to improve the level of preschool education in China. However, due to the differences in objective environment, the introduction of foreign theories will inevitably require a localization process to truly meet the development needs of domestic children. This may be the reason why some kindergartens have learned Reggio but don't know how to use it. At present, the breadth and depth of theoretical research on preschool education in China are not enough. Most of the existing research topics are about children's behavioral and psychological development needs, and there is little research on new situations and new problems. In addition, many early childhood education research experiments are often limited to kindergartens for three years, lacking repeated verification, and there are few long-term follow-up studies like the Start plan in the United States. Therefore, the long-term effect of early childhood education is difficult to know, and the function of early childhood education lacks strong empirical evidence, thus reducing the effectiveness of early childhood education scientific experiments in theoretical formation and the impact on policy formulation. There are many reasons for this. On the one hand, preschool education in China started late, and there are not many specialized preschool researchers. The scientific research ability of preschool teachers needs to be improved, and the theoretical research team is relatively weak. On the other hand, the relevant departments do not pay enough attention to it, and the research can not get the financial support it deserves, which makes the actual research exist in name only. According to the 10th Five-Year Plan of Education Science in Guangzhou, there are 6 major projects, of which only 1 project is for preschool education research, accounting for 17%. There are 9 key topics on the plane, among which there is no research topic about early childhood education; There are 62 general topics, including 5 research topics on early childhood education, accounting for 8%; 18, in which there is no research topic about early childhood education. It can be seen that the scientific research projects of early childhood education are not paid attention to either in the number of scientific research projects or in the financial support, which objectively affects the more universal and in-depth development of early childhood education and scientific research. [ 1 1]

5. The present situation of preschool teachers' continuing education is not optimistic.

Teachers' quality is the core content of teachers' professionalization. Teacher education is divided into two stages: pre-service education and post-service training. Preschool teachers have short pre-service education time and no practical experience. Therefore, after-service education is very important for the professional development of preschool teachers. The pre-service training of preschool teachers in China is mainly completed by secondary normal schools, and the starting point of cultural knowledge and theoretical level is low, so post-service continuing education is particularly important. In fact, for a long time, the professional training of kindergarten teachers lacked planning, and was more limited by factors such as funds, time and personnel arrangement, rather than on-demand training, which led to the imbalance of training work. Some teachers have been trained many times, and some teachers have few training opportunities, ignoring the training of nurses. [12] Especially in private kindergartens, teachers' rights of continuing education are not guaranteed, and on-the-job training has become a big problem. Moreover, at present, the on-the-job training of kindergarten teachers, which is mainly undertaken by kindergarten teachers' normal schools or district teachers' further education schools, often takes subject theoretical knowledge as the only training goal, and even "repeats" the courses of normal schools or teachers' colleges to a great extent, ignoring the cultivation and improvement of teachers' professional ability. At the same time, due to the limitation of the professional level and education level of the personnel who undertake the training task, the content of continuing education can not meet the needs of teachers' professional growth, or even out of touch, which delays the process of teachers' professional growth. [13] China Encyclopedia of Preschool Education regards "making up general cultural and scientific knowledge" as one of the main contents of teachers' professional training, and the main purpose of cultivating in-service kindergarten teachers is to "improve their working ability. What to do, what to learn, what to lack and what to make up. " [14] It can be seen that the in-service education of preschool teachers in China is still at a low level, far from meeting the requirements of specialization.

The professional development of preschool teachers is a long-term struggle process, which not only requires preschool teachers to clearly understand their professionalism and make positive progress, but also needs the support of appropriate external environment. Only the internal and external coordinated development can gradually promote the specialization of preschool teachers in China.

References:

[1] yellow. Profession, qualification and specialization of teachers [J]. Journal of Jimei University Education, 200 1, (6).

[2] Yu Jing. Teacher specialization and teacher education specialization [J]. Journal of Inner Mongolia Normal University (Education Edition), 2004, (1 1).

[3] Qu Baokui, editor in chief. The new progress of education research in China 2000 [M]. Shanghai: East China Normal University Press, 200 1, 345.

[4] See Hu Dingrong. Reflections on teachers' professional standards [J]. Research on Higher Normal Education, 2003, (1).

[5] NAEYC。 Conceptual framework of preschool professional development. 1993,( 1 1)。

[6] Yang Ning et al. Concerned about the anxiety of preschool teachers [J]. Early Education, 2003, (9).

[7] [13] Peng Bing. The main obstacles and countermeasures of preschool teachers' professional growth [J]. Preschool Education Research, 2004, (1 1).

[8] Pang et al. Problems and Suggestions on the Development of Preschool Education in China [J]. Preschool Education Research, 2002, (1).

[9] Piaget, translated by Fu Tongxian. Educational science and child psychology [M]. Beijing: Culture and Education Press,1981; Quoted from Ning Hong et al. "Teachers become researchers: an important trend of teachers' professional development" [J]. Educational Research, 2000, (7).

[10] edited by Zheng Hangsheng. Introduction to Sociology (3rd Edition) [M]. Beijing: Renmin University of China Press, 2003, pages 245-247.

[1 1] See the list of educational science projects in Guangzhou during the Tenth Five-Year Plan.

[12] [14] Lu Leshan et al. ed. Encyclopedia of China Preschool Education Theory Volume [M]. Shenyang: Shenyang Publishing House,1995,229.

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